"How
could you not
be suckered
into enjoying such a devilishly hard-boiled
comedy romp!"

Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz

This was one of the six collaborations (The Secret
Six, Red
Dust,
China Seas, Wife vs. Secretary, and Saratoga) between
Jean Harlow and
Clark
Gable, all money-makers and richly entertaining. The
unlucky in love
Harlow
died of a cerebral hemorrhage at age 26, in 1937.
Veteran filmmaker Sam
Wood effectively directed this romantic comedy that
turns into a drama.
It might be the least known the duo did, but it
nevertheless sparkles
with
snappy dialogue and Harlow matching wits with Gable
line for line. In
one
such exchange Gable says "You know all the answers."
Harlow replies
"Yeah,
to all the dumb questions." Harlow goes on to tell him
"Even your smile
is crooked." My favorite Harlowism is "I got two rules
when I go out
visiting:
keep away from couches and stay on your feet." How
could you not be
suckered
into enjoying such a devilishly hard-boiled comedy
romp, especially if
you were part of the Depression audience! The film is
only weakened,
but
not entirely killed, by a third act that turns phony
sentimental after
its brisk-pace and non-stop humor grinds to a halt
with the prison
scenes
of Harlow.

Warning: spoiler in next
paragraph.

Small-time confidence man Eddie Hall pulls a fast
one on a
greedy
sucker over a phony diamond ring and is forced to
escape the pursing
cops
by ducking into Ruby Adam's flat while she's taking a
bubble-bath. She
shields him from the cops and the similar types hit it
off, seeing each
other a month later in a Brooklyn dance hall womanizer
Eddie frequents.
Ruby's there with stable nice-guy Al Simpson, who has
a good job with a
Cincinnati firm and is madly in love with her. But
Ruby is attracted to
the smooth-talking Eddie and ends up staying over in
his Flatbush
Avenue
apartment. Eddie gets involved with a criminal scheme
involving fellow
con artists Slim and Phil Dunn, but gets nabbed before
the heist
driving
a hot car. He spends 90 days in the cooler, while Ruby
lives in his
pad.
When he gets out Slim talks Eddie into pulling a sting
on wealthy
married
guy laundry owner (Paul Hurst) making a play for Ruby.
The drunk wolf
shows
up pawing Ruby and the irate Eddie slugs him, not
realizing he hit him
so hard that he killed him. Eddie goes on-the-lam,
while Ruby gets sent
to prison. In prison, Ruby learns she's pregnant. The
wanted Eddie
doesn't
write or dare visit, until he can't wait any longer
and arranges a
visit
posing as the brother of Ruby's cellmate Bertha. Eddie
talks African
American
preacher (George H. Reed), the father of Ruby's
cellmate Lily Mae, into
marrying them (this scene was substituted for southern
audiences with a
white preacher). While in the prison chapel, the
suspicious matrons
called
the police and Eddie is arrested. After serving a
two-year stretch,
Eddie
goes straight and the couple with their son move to
Cincy because Al
got
Eddie a job in his firm.

You can miss the last reel and its schmaltzy
depiction of
prison
life, but the first two reels are very entertaining as
the stars
deliver
big time performances.